Whispering
by mutemockingjay
Summary: RvB- For love itself was a mass of whispers- of passion of lust, of heartbreak and everything in between. A sweetheart on his knees, a cold gaze, the choking tendrils of jealousy. Various pairings for the lover100 challenge.
1. First Meeting

**A/N: This is one of my 'let's get unblocked on GtS' attempts, this time with an LJ challenge- lover100, with one hundred love themed prompts. So here we are with the first one- Wash/South, of course. ;)**

**Also, whoever catches the "bother" reference wins at life. **

**The French roughly translates to:**

**"Miss Howard, is there are a problem?"**

**"No, Madame. I've finished my exam."**

**"Very good, my dear. You may leave/you're dismissed."**

**Much thanks to Melta for helping me with the French, as I have lost almost all my skills.  
**

* * *

Cassie leaned back, sticking the pen in her messy half bun. She had finished the French examination in record time- not like that was any surprise. She had a one night stand with some French speaking guy from Canada the summer previous; easily picking up every dirty word she could and moving on from there.

She was one of the few sophomores in AP French; more often than not this was a junior class, a desperate rush to gain college credits in any way possible. But as she gazed around the room she noticed she was not one of the only sophomores in there- a few nerds scattered here or there, and a guy she vaguely recognized as one of her brother's friends. Slightly rumpled brown hair, dark blue eyes, crooked half smile as he noticed her watching him.

_Shit._

She pulled her pen out of her hair and busied herself with questions she had already answered. A piece of paper fluttered delicately onto her desk and curious, she picked it up and read it.

**Nice try. You finished those questions half an hour ago.**

She glanced to her left, and then to right, finally spotting the mysterious sender. Sure enough, it was her brother's friend, an arrogant smirk on his face.

Of course, the jerk had to look even more handsome when he was mocking her. Damn him.

**What the fuck? You were watching me? Fuck off, loser.**

She lobbed the paper in his direction, and he caught it with ease.

He was bent over the desk as he replied, flicking his hair out of his eyes in irritation. She noted the teeth marks on the top of his pen and caught herself smiling without thinking.

**No. I'm not going to stop bothering you until you tell me your name. **

Cassie growled, her thumb smearing the ink as she scribbled a response.

**Go fuck someone else. I'm not interested. **

She turned her attention back to her paper, hoping that being absorbed in verb conjugations would stop her heart from flipping over at the sight of him.

A crumbled piece of paper hit her desk. A second, third, fourth. Another by her feet, and a sixth hit the back of her head.

"What the hell?" She hissed under her breath, glaring at him. He had a perfectly innocent expression on his face, but his eyes told a different story- they flashed with a wicked, infuriating gleam.

She opened one, squinting as she attempted to decipher his messy scrawls.

**Bother. **

She opened the rest.

**Bother. **

**Bother. **

**Bother. **

**Bother.**

**You look pretty when you smile.**

"God damn it!"

Her French teacher looked up from her desk, where she had sat pretending to grade papers but secretly reading the latest issue of Cosmo. "Mademoiselle Howard, Est quil y a une probleme, ici?"

Cassie smiled sweetly, "Non, Madame, ca va bien. J'ai finir avec l'examen."

"Tres bein, cherie. Tu petut sortir maintenant."

"Merci." With that, she swept up her book bag, deposited her exam on her teacher's desk and walked past him with her nose in the air, as if not to give him a second thought.

On his desk a single piece of paper remained, and he unfolded it.

**Cassie. **


	2. Water

**A/N: Still hopelessly blocked. The quote comes from Spring Awakening (the musical) during the infamous hayloft scene and its song, I Believe. **

**Much thanks to Ten Ways to Spoil Dinner for betaing this for me.  
**

* * *

_Would you come back to the meadow now, Melchior? It's so dark in here, and stuffy. We could run through the rain, get soaked to the skin and not even care!_

_- Wendla, Spring Awakening_

_

* * *

_

Her hands on the locking mechanism to his armor plates, fingers shaking in her eagerness. All of her usual dignity gone as she hungered for him, for his touch. And he hers, like he never thought he would. His friend; his other half in battle; the one who was always there with a word or a gesture that he never thought he needed until she gave it.

And then there were the curveballs he never saw coming. Little surprises that made him wonder that if in all his knowing her, responding to her, whether he actually ever would be able to figure out the person underneath the Cerise colored armor.

Such as this moment now, where in a rude awakening, York was hit in the face with clothes pulled from one of his drawers. Armor off, dizzy with her touch he stared stupidly at them, as if he had never seen cotton before in his life.

At once she sensed his discomfort and grabbed his hand, her head bowed. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to be so careless but…"

She gave him a childish grin, leaving the room with a scamper, and he groaned in part frustration, part desire.

"But what, 'Lina?" he called after her, and she poked her head around the corner.

"But you'll have to catch me to find out."

Pulling the clothes on he shook his head, still dumbstruck by the idea that Carolina, _his_ Carolina, could abandon her quiet dignity and serene just for a moment spawned by- well, come to think of it, he had no idea what this sudden bout of playfulness was triggered by. But when he heard the echoing sound of her laughter, the slapping thud of her bare feet against the floor, he knew he'd be damned if he didn't figure out what.

* * *

The rain felt good on her skin- at first a light sprinkle as she ran past the outskirts of the base, but soon a rough, demanding patter that made her hair hung in wet clumps, sticking to her neck and forehead.

Her breath coming in short pants, muscles aching as her feet sunk into the now muddy sand, coating her calves in the sticky splatter. She could sense him behind her just as she always sensed his presence, his next move; just as easily on the battlefield as she did right now.

And she wanted it. Wanted to know that he would always be by her side, wanted to know that he was just as devoted to her as she was to him, wanted to feel his arms around her waist.

A thunderclap so loud that it couldn't possibly be real; the sweet scent of water and earth and love, all tied up into one as her final burst of adrenaline fell stagnant and he caught up to her. The rain had soaked through his shirt, his dark brown hair tousled in some places, stuck to his forehead in others, as if he had been hit by lightening. Skin flushed and lips full; she could barely bite back the longing to kiss him right then and there.

But she didn't need to, for he did so first; pulling her so close to him that their bodies were one, his lips on her neck, her jaw line, her collarbone and finally her lips until she could no longer breathe. Pulling away slightly, her words no more than a quiet sigh, a whisper on his neck, "York…"

"Yeah?"

She raised her chin to meet his, her dark eyes shining, "I love you."


	3. Lush

**A/N: Much thanks to Haley for betaing this. I ended up really enjoying writing this. In this case I used the alcohol related definition of "lush". **

* * *

They were at it again. Granted, at least the arguments were better than the habitually loud sex. Or maybe Maine was just twisted like that, preferring it when the pair of them were close to falling apart as opposed to when they were happy.

It was selfish; it was beyond selfish. And since he didn't want to think about what a complete and utter bastard he was, he decided it was time to put his stash of whiskey to good use and get hopelessly shitfaced.

He was on his second drink when the door opened, and Wash entered, his helmet dangling in one hand the other scratching the back of his neck, a habit Maine knew he slipped into whenever he was particularly upset but didn't want anyone to notice.

Too bad Wash was very rarely good at being subtle.

Then again, neither was South. That's probably how they ended up fucking each other senseless, Maine thought bitterly as he drained the remaining droplets of his third drink.

"Hey." Wash sunk onto the floor next to Maine. "Mind if I..?" He gestured to the bottle, and Maine shrugged his shoulders.

"Go ahead."

"Thanks." He poured himself a large drink, and glanced at Maine with a curious look in his blue eyes, one that Maine couldn't read, as much as he wanted to. "Drowning your sorrows, too, Maine? Who is it this time? Connecticut?"

Maine shook his head, helping himself to a fourth drink. "Nope. I don't have any sorrows to drown." He attempted a weak smile. "Besides, she's off doing…fuck if I know. Doesn't matter."

"That's bullshit." Wash downed his second with astonishing speed.

Maine shrugged his shoulders, "She can do whatever the hell she wants; I don't care."

"No, I mean," Wash poured himself another drink, and gave a more than generous splash to Maine as well, "I mean that you telling me you don't have any sorrows to drown is complete bullshit."

The only response Maine could make was a guttural 'ack' sound as he promptly choked on his whiskey.

_Smooth. Real smooth. _

Wash raised an eyebrow, and Maine managed to recover himself enough to rasp, "You asshole."

"What?" Wash swirled the remainder of the drink in his glass, looking down at the nearly empty bottle in disappointment. He was only just beginning to feel the effects of the alcohol, and he knew he sure as hell needed more than a buzz to get through tonight.

His cheeks flushed, and his hair hanging in his face, Maine's thoughts began to stumble, and he struggled to make sense of them. "'Cause I could have like, dunno, choked on it and it would have gotten into my lungs and then…" He poured the remainder of the bottle into his glass and downed it in one gulp. "And then I would drown in it and get pneumonia or some shit like that, and then…dunno. But you're still an asshole."

Wash rolled his eyes, standing up and grabbing another bottle from one of the many in disarray on Maine's bookcase. "Methinks the lady doth protest too much." He paused, "And that Sigma has been getting to you."

"Fuck you."

Wash sunk back onto the floor next to his friend and shook his head. "That's all relationships are. Loud sex, or even louder fighting." He had lost count of how many drinks he poured, which he knew was never a good sign but was far from caring. He sighed, looking at his rippled reflection in the amber liquid and back at Maine.

"Yesh, so?" Maine slurred.

"So why do we put up with it?" Wash bit his lower lip, knocking back more of the whiskey. He wasn't drunk enough to be having this conversation. He wasn't sure if he could _ever_ be drunk enough to have this conversation.

"Dunno."

_Love._

The word was in Maine's thoughts, but nothing in the world would ever get him to say it. Instead he reached for the bottle but in his dizziness overshot his reach and stumbled, ending up somewhat in Wash's lap.

"Sorry," he muttered, sure that he blushing like a thirteen year old schoolgirl. His drunken haze lifted slightly at the humiliation, but Wash barely noticed, his gaze fixed on something Maine couldn't see.

The pair sat in agonizing silence for a few minutes- at least it was agonizing as far as Maine was concerned, sipping his drink in an effort not to slip into his nervous habit of biting his nails. Wash didn't seem to care either way, and Maine was surprised at his friend's silence. Not that Wash was a particularly talkative person, usually only speaking when he had something to say.

But the silence surrounding him now was different, less decisive and more…well, Maine had no idea what it was. He shook his head and poured himself more whiskey. Maybe Wash was right. Maybe Sigma _was_ getting to him.

"Maine?"

Maine considered himself lucky that he hadn't been in mid sip again, otherwise he would have choked on his drink for the second time in the evening, and one time was too many.

"Even if a relationship only ends up in loud sex and arguments, would you still be in one?"

"Dunno." Normally Maine would have given Wash a hard time for being a sentimental, philosophical drunk, but the expression in Wash's blue eyes made him shut his goddamn mouth- for once.

"She…" Wash wasn't usually the type to leaving a sentence hanging, but Maine didn't bother inquiring, though whether that was for his or Wash's sake, he had no idea.

_You know it has nothing to do with Wash, and everything to do with you._ The sneaking voice in the back of his head reminded him, and Maine hated his own thoughts for this, though he had to concede that Sigma might have said the same thing. At least Sig was kind- as kind as a computer program could be.

"She isn't worth it," Wash muttered to himself. "Not when she insists on picking fights over…"

With those words Maine's hand shook, spilling whiskey on his lap. He hardly dared to breathe, as if doing so would make the next sentence disappear and never come back.

_You're a fucking idiot_ the voice told him, and he mentally gave the voice the finger.

Wash shot Maine a guilty look, tapping his fingernails against the glass, and exhaling quickly.

_Tap._

_Tap._

_Tap._

_Tap._

Just when the sound was enough to make Maine tear his hair out, Wash spoke. "…Not when she insists on picking fights over you."

Maine blinked; there was no way he had heard that right. It must have been wistful thinking, like some freaky hallucination shit. Still, with even less self control than usual, his tongue loosened by alcohol he couldn't help but ask. "Me?"

"Yes." Wash poured himself more whiskey, his eyes slightly glassy. "She's convinced…" he muttered a stream of words under his breath that Maine couldn't fully hear; though he swore he caught the phrase 'she's right' and 'damn her'. "Aw, fuck it," he said, this time audible enough for Maine to catch every word.

And then Wash's lips were on his for an all too brief kiss, nervous and shy and sweet. All too soon, however, it was over and Maine let out a small sigh of disappointment.

"She was right. I've…been waiting to do that for a while." Wash traced the rim of the glass with his fingertip, giving Maine the same guilty look he had before.

And that was something Maine could never stand for. This time when they kissed it was far from brief, and with his lips wet and his heart pounding, Maine leaned in, very quietly whispering in Wash's ear. "How about we just skip to the loud sex and forget the arguing?"

Wash pulled himself upright, and held his hand out to Maine to do the same. "It's like you read my mind."

"Damn straight."


End file.
